IT Security in 2014: Challenges and More Challenges

Information technology has become a business essential. We’ve reached the point where our ability to thrive and succeed depends on key software apps and the technology (wherever it may be) that runs them, our access-from-anywhere to the Internet, and our ability to gather and analyze troves of digitized data.

The easiest targets
So important are these capabilities that we often put them into use before we’ve figured out the myriad of ways they’re vulnerable to those with malicious intent. And while smaller enterprises used to be able to escape the worst of these vulnerabilities simply by slipping beneath cybercriminals’ radar, those days are gone.

In fact, less protected smaller businesses have become a favorite for some attackers — just like homes with unlocked doors and windows attract burglars seeking the easiest targets.

It ain’t pretty
This is why, as 2014 rolls along, I’ve decided to take a look at what security experts are currently telling us about our foremost security exposures.

Here’s some of the worst of it, presented in tip-of-the-iceberg fashion: